March 17. The day dedicated to Ireland's patron saint. But over the years it has transformed into grand festivities with Guinness and Irish dancing.
In Regina, the celebration is kicking off for June Carter and Joe Morkan, who moved to the queen city from Ireland in October. They now teach Irish dancing in the community, and are excited to join the St. Patrick's day festivities in their new city.
"We'll teach our class first and then we're going to Bushwakker," says Joe.
And at O'Hanlon's, St. Patrick's Day is being celebrated just as enthusiastically. Not only is today the bar's 12th birthday - Niall O'Hanlon, the pub's owner, says this is the busiest night of the year. "It's our busiest day of the year by far. It's just a blast. Everyone is out for a good time."
Today, O'Hanlon expects to go through 50 kegs of Guinness. "It'd be like 10 times what we normally go through."
But this pub is no stranger when it comes to selling the legendary Irish brew. Going into today's festivities, O'Hanlon's is the second largest vendor of Guinness stout in Canada, and they have top spot in their sights.
"We have good Guinness and we sell enough of it. And our goal for the year is to be number one. And we haven't got the populace to be number one in North America just yet," says O'Hanlon.
Unfortunately for non-Irish Canadians, the already long line at O'Hanlon's could get quite lengthy, as special attention will be paid of O'Hanlon's countrymen. "We always try to get somebody with an Irish accent in pretty quick. It's the only day of the year where we discriminate."
